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Converting Fractions to Decimals/Transcript
Transcript Text reads: The Mysteries of Life with Tim and Moby Tim is doing homework. Moby is on the phone. He hangs up and the doorbell rings. Moby goes to the door and returns with 3 boxes of pizza. TIM: That's a lot of pizza. Are we having a party or something? MOBY: Beep. Tim reads from a typed letter. TIM: Dear Tim and Moby, can you help me with changing fractions into decimals? From, Samantha. Hey, what fantastic luck; that's just what I'm doing! Perhaps Moby's pizza can help. Moby frowns and opens the box of pizza. TIM: This large pizza is cut into 10 slices. It's one whole pie, or 10-tenths pieces. A fraction appears reading: 10/10. TIM: Fractions indicate division, in this case we know that a whole pizza has 10 slices. On-screen, the 10 in the fraction's denominator flashes. TIM: And so far there are 10 pieces still here. On-screen, the 10 in the fraction's numerator flashes. TIM: So 10 divided by 10 equals the whole number 1. An equation appears, reading, 10/10 equals 1. Moby beeps and takes 2 slices of pizza. TIM: Moby's apparently really hungry, and we're left with 8 out of 10 pieces. That's eight-tenths of the pizza. A fraction appears, reading 8/10. TIM: Now the key thing to know here is the decimal places. A chart appears. From left to right, the first 3 columns are labeled "hundreds," "tens," and "ones." The middle column is labeled "decimal point." The next 3 columns from left to right are labeled, "tenths," "hundredths," and "thousandths." An arrow points to the "tenths" column. Each column is filled in with a 0. TIM: It's easy to see where the tenths position is… All we have to do is slip our 8 in there. On-screen, an 8 replaces the 0 in the tenths column, immediately to the right of the decimal point. TIM: So, 8/10 in decimal form is 0.8. This method works for all fractions that have a 10, 100, 1,000, or some other power of 10 in their denominator. Fractions appear, reading: 9/10; 77/100; and 337/1,000. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Right, what about other fractions, like, oh, I don't know… Tim opens a small pizza box. TIM: This small pizza, as you can see, has been cut into 6 pieces. A fraction appears, reading 6/6. Moby takes a slice of pizza. TIM: Okay, now we have 5/6 of a pizza. On-screen, the fraction changes to 5/6. TIM: To write 5/6 as a decimal, we need to calculate 5 divided by 6. You can calculate it out using long division or with a calculator, if you have one available. A long division equation appears, reading 5 divided by 6 equals 0.83, followed by many more 3s. TIM: That's 0.83333333… and so on. When a decimal repeats a number like that, it's called a… MOBY: Beep. TIM: Yup, a repeating decimal. A label reading "repeating decimal" appears below the solution. TIM: We can round it off at the hundredths place if we like, and say that 5/6 is about 0.83, or 83-hundredths. A decimal appears, reading, 0.83. It turns into the fraction, 83-hundredths. TIM: And that's how you convert fractions to decimals. MOBY: Beep. TIM: Oh! What if you want to convert back to fractions? Well, that's easy. Take that 0.83. As I said before, it’s also called 83-hundredths. An equation appears, reading, 0.83 equals 83/100. TIM: We know that because the last digit is in the hundredths place. On-screen, the decimal, 0.83, appears in the labeled chart. The number, 8, is in the tenths column, and the number, 3, is in the hundredths column. TIM: To convert back to a fraction, place the numbers after the decimal point over the whole number value of the last digit’s place. On-screen, the hundredths column is highlighted. TIM: So for instance, here, since it's 83-hundredths, we'll make it 83 over 100. A fraction appears, reading, 83/100. TIM: If you had a number like 0.754, or 754-thousandths, you'd put 754 over 1,000. A decimal appears, reading, 0.754. It changes into the fraction, 754/1,000. TIM: If you can simplify, you probably should. Let’s see… divide top and bottom by 2… that makes 377/500! The fraction, 754-thousandths, simplifies to 377/500. TIM: And that’s how you convert a decimal back to a fraction! MOBY: Beep. TIM: So, you, um… you gonna eat all this pizza? Moby nods his head, yes. TIM: Are you sure? MOBY: Beep. TIM: Because there's a lot here; more than you could possibly eat, unless you want to make yourself sick. There's no way you could safely eat it all. I could help you. You know… help you eat this pizza. If you want. Moby frowns. Tim grins. Category:BrainPOP Transcripts Category:BrainPOP Math Transcripts